True Life Tuesday: Gay Gibson

This is a very sad story whether you believe the man who was convicted of murder or not.

Eileen Isabella Ronnie Gibson was born on June 16, 1926. She was an actress and went by the stage name of Gay Gibson. In October 1947 she was sailing back to her home in London from a theater tour in South Africa on the Durban Castle. On the ship she caught the attention of one of the stewards, James Camb. Gay and Camb were seen associating with each other. This was against the ship's protocol and led to Camb being reprimanded.

ON the evening of October 17, 1947 Gay was escorted to her cabin by two friends around 11:30pm. Around 3am the night duty watchman, Frederick Steer, was awoken by a summons to Gay's cabin. When  he arrived Camb opened the door only slightly and advised that everything was fine. In the morning the female steward, Eileen Field, came to clean the room to find it empty. She did note that there were stains on the bed sheets and the porthole was open. 

The ship commander, Captain Patey, interviewed Camb who originally denied being in Gay's room. After being confronted with the fact that the captain knew that Steer saw him in the room he stated that Gay died during consensual sex. Afraid of losing his job and family he panicked and pushed her body out of the porthole. The captain ordered the ship to turn around to look for her body. He also sent a message to the headquarters of the ship owner Castle Line asking them to have the police meet them when they arrived in port. Camb was confined to his cabin by the crew for the rest of the journey. 

On October 27, 1947 Camb was charged with Gay's murder. The press was fascinated with the case and compared it to an Agatha Christie story. During the trial the pathologist, Denis Hocking, testified that the stain on the sheets was urine and could have been the result of her being strangled. While on the stand the prosecutor confronted Camb with the fact that he changed his story 6 times. Camb stated that pushing her body out of the porthole as "beastly conduct" but he maintained his innocence. 

The trial lasted 4 days and the jury deliberated for 45 minutes before returning with a guilty verdict. He was sentenced to death on March 22, 1948. However, the sentence was not carried out because Parliament was in the process of considering abolishing capital punishment and executions were placed on hold during the process. Camb entered an appeal of his conviction in April 1948 but it was denied. He was released from prison in 1959 but was sent back after being convicted of indecent assaults on young girls. He was released from prison again in 1978 and died of heart failure in July 1979. He maintained his innocence until he died and Gay's body was never recovered.